Monday, June 17, 2013

You have something special on your hands, a true phenom, a man among boys on the baseball field, but because you’ve been around the game a long time, you know there are hundreds just like him around the country, and you understand that injuries happen and flameouts happen and life happens. So you use some perspective. You talk about needing to be realistic. You aim on the low side.

“You go out and have a good high school career,” Jeff Trout once told his son, Mike, “and you’ll have a chance to have a college career — for free. And then, we’ll see what happens.”

The Post now has a paywall in place, but they allow everyone 20 free reads per month… would someone point me to BTF’s policy on this sort of thing? Thanks.

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Begin with some WAR. Wins above replacement, or WAR, is the catch-all stat, popularized in the last decade, that aims to measure a player’s overall value, factoring in not only his batting skills but his defense and base running as well. It has been a useful tool for front-office types and media members — until Trout came along, with his almost unprecedented mix of power, hitting prowess, speed and defense, and nearly broke it.

The headline simply means "Trout is great," which is not arguable. But "no ceiling" literally is an interesting if fantastic claim. Put it this way: again by WAR, 14 players since 1893 have had a season as good as Trout's 2012. There are three players ever to have two seasons that good: Ruth, Mantle, and Mays. (Well, Ruth had six.) So if Trout even repeats 2012, he's already at the effective ceiling that the sport puts on humans. The 14 who have ever had 10.9 WAR seasons are inner-inner-circle HOFers, and Ruth-Mantle-Mays might be the precise three players that even someone who'd never heard of baseball would associate with the sport, its WG Graces or Wayne Gretzkys.

Simply that Trout's not even necessarily the best young player in the American League. Of course this is a bit like arguing whether you'd rather have a billion dollars in $100 bills or a billion dollars in $50 bills, and it's obviously no knock on Trout.

And BTW Sheinin himself agrees that it's now a 3-way argument, with Machado added to the Trout-Harper debate. This was what he wrote less than a month ago:

How big of a WAR hit does Trout take this year (offensive and defensive) from nothing other than the projected 100+ games that Peter Bourjos will play?

In theory it shouldn't be much of one. The position adjustments assume that the difference in offense between a typical CF and a typical LF will be made up for with better defense. Of course that's all theoretical and may not apply in the specific case of Trout.

The position adjustment moving from CF to LF is 10 runs. So if he was equally valuable defensively he'd lose 1 WAR.

How big of a WAR hit does Trout take this year (offensive and defensive) from nothing other than the projected 100+ games that Peter Bourjos will play?

Another interesting aspect of WAR. In principle, Trout loses some value if he plays LF. In reality, if Bourjos really is a better CF, it doesn't diminish Trout's value to the Angels at all if he plays LF. If he were on nearly any other team he'd play CF, so the "WAR hit" for playing left is somewhat theoretical.

Simply that Trout's not even necessarily the best young player in the American League.

We'll see. Seems clear he is. Unless you expect Machado to maintain his wRC+ of 132 on a 4% BB rate, while also expecting Trout's defense to be well below what it was last year (while Machado's remains as highly rated as it is this year).

Simply that Trout's not even necessarily the best young player in the American League.

We'll see. Seems clear he is. Unless you expect Machado to maintain his wRC+ of 132 on a 4% BB rate, while also expecting Trout's defense to be well below what it was last year (while Machado's remains as highly rated as it is this year).

When it comes to talents like Trout and Machado, I'm not really sure just what we can expect, other than to say that there's nothing at all clear as to which way the dust will settle. For Christ's sake, you're talking about two players whose combined ages aren't equal to Mariano Rivera's, and one of the most impressive things about both of them is the ways they've been able to adjust to the adjustments that the pitchers have been making against them. I say let's just enjoy them both for what they are.

I’m an Orioles fan, and I think it’s pretty clear that Trout is a better player than Machado right now. Machado v Harper is much closer.

When we’re talking about ceiling and who will have the best career, Machado has the advantage of more room to grow physically than the other two, and although it’s extremely early, Machado has shown impressive durability. Plus, he’s playing out of position.

Machado hasn’t even been in the majors for a full year, and he already holds the active AL consecutive innings played streak (although that probably says more about modern usage patterns than anything else).

Greg Morhardt, an area scout for the Angels, had a territory that encompassed most of the Northeast. The first time he saw Trout, as a 16-year-old, he almost couldn’t believe his eyes. In his report on Trout to his bosses, he wrote, “Will play in many all-star games, with a chance to be a Hall of Fame player.”

Pointing out the Manny Machado is awesome is fine by me. It's been a long time since baseball has had 3 young talents, all roughly one year apart in age, as great as Harper/Machado/Trout.

Maybe all the way back to Mantle/Mays/Matthews.

OK, Aaron/Robinson/Kaline weren't too bad in 1956 either.

The difference between HMT and MMM is that it took four years for MMM to be on the same productive page, whereas HMT all hit the ground running at the age of within a few months of one another. And even with ARK, it wasn't until 1956 that all three of them were among the league's premier players, and by that point Aaron was in his third year. Right now I'd say that HMT is the most impressive trio for their age and experience that I've ever seen.

Another interesting aspect of WAR. In principle, Trout loses some value if he plays LF. In reality, if Bourjos really is a better CF, it doesn't diminish Trout's value to the Angels at all if he plays LF. If he were on nearly any other team he'd play CF, so the "WAR hit" for playing left is somewhat theoretical.

This is absolutely not true. WAR measures realized value... the problem with defensive WAR is that it is team-dependent, unlike offensive WAR which is mostly team-independent. For offensive WAR, there is a high correlation between ability and oWAR because teammates only have a weak influence on opportunity; for defensive WAR, there is less correlation between defensive ability and dWAR because dWAR is very dependent on opportunity provided by teammates (both the pitchers and teammates filling positions with more opportunity to produce value).

The WAR hit is not theoretical, it is real. Trout produces less value if he plays LF than CF (fact). Now, he may be more valuable *to the Angels* in LF than CF because of Bourjos (i.e. Bourjos in LF and Trout in CF may be worse for the Angels than Trout in LF and Bourjos in CF), but that's not what dWAR is measuring. It's measuring value produced and you just can't produce that as much value in LF as you can in CF. It's the defensive equivalent to playing someone only 3 out of every 4 games as opposed to playing them every day in terms of their offensive contribution.

If you want to measure defensive ability or *potential* value, you have to pro-rate WAR by opportunity (which is hard, but being hard to do doesn't make it not the right thing to do).

Fair enough, Russ, but it's a matter of definitions as much as anything else. You say yourself that Trout is more valuable to the Angels, and he remains as valuable as ever in a hypothetical trade to another team that needs a CF. And I'll grant that he produces less value in LF (the analogy of using him less often is attractive); but given that a team needs both a LF and a CF, it's academic to them, and they're the ones playing the baseball games

It's been a long time since baseball has had 3 young talents, all roughly one year apart in age, as great as Harper/Machado/Trout.

Just for fun I looked up some players at certain age. And this is not to imply these names are really equivalent to what people are actually looking for when they made a comment like that. But still.

In 1989.... you had 19 year old Ken Griffey Jr, 20 year old Gary Sheffield and 21 year old Roberto Alomar(Sheffield only had cups of coffee) and even 20 year old Sammy Sosa all playing that year(along with 20 year old Juan Gonzalez, and John Olerud also playing)

Machado's walk rates in the minors weren't terrible, but his offense overall is obviously way better than he ever did in the minors (as opposed to Trout or Harper, who aren't totally out-of-whack). That said, they're all so young and have such high ceilings that you can't base too much on the minor league numbers; the possibility of taking a step forward at the same time they hit the majors is very real.

The WAR hit is not theoretical, it is real. Trout produces less value if he plays LF than CF (fact).

What does this even mean? WAR is an estimate of value provided above a theoretical replacement level. It may be our best estimate, but of course it is theoretical. I think you get that based on the rest of your post, but we should be careful about making statements about the "real"-ness of WAR.

The WAR hit is not theoretical, it is real. Trout produces less value if he plays LF than CF (fact).

Is this true for oWAR as well? Isn't he measured against a replacement level left fielder, who is presumably a better hitter than a replacement level center fielder? If two players put up identical offensive numbers, but play different defensive positions, won't their oWAR be different?

In 1989.... you had 19 year old Ken Griffey Jr, 20 year old Gary Sheffield and 21 year old Roberto Alomar(Sheffield only had cups of coffee) and even 20 year old Sammy Sosa all playing that year(along with 20 year old Juan Gonzalez, and John Olerud also playing)

We have several other young players active now, or working their way through the minors, or who just got drafted who will go on to have HOF careers. But we don't know who they are yet. Trout/Machado/Harper are already among the very best players in baseball.

In 1989:

Sheffield had an 82 OPS+, he was a 20 year old SS but not a good shortstop. He was all potential.
Alomar was very good, 107 OPS+, 42 steals, good D at second. An above average player, but not yet a superstar
Same with Griffey, 108 OPS+ in center. Gonzalez had 60 AB, and hit .150. Olerud hit .375, but in only 8 AB. Sosa had an 89 OPS+ in 58 games.

None of them were anywhere near as good as the 2013 trio are right now. That would come later.

I don't think WAR neccesarily overestimated Trout last year, but it was the perfect storm for baserunning, defensive value and park factors. I doubt Trout is going to go 49/54 on SB again and he's probably unlikely to put up a +14 run defensive performance (even that's reasonable for a young, elite level defender) and he's unlikely to put up a .383 BABIP, but I think it's likely that Trout actually earned those numbers last year.

BTW, his offense has mostly taken a step forward this year. More walks, fewer strikeouts, about the same ISO. His BABIP is down .040 points which is why his wRC+ is slightly lower. I think Trout has as good a chance as anyone playing to put up another 10 WAR, although it's probably not likely again considering defense and baserunning peak so early.

Simply that Trout's not even necessarily the best young player in the American League.

Trout is 22 and has 8 fWAR per 600 PA in 1099 career PA. Machado is one year younger than Trout and has 5.8 WAR per 600 PA in 529 career PA. And that comes with a 24.7 UZR/150. What kind of dumbshit comment is this?

Edit: this was a little harsh. So far Trout has played much better than Machado and has done it for twice as long. Let's give the man some credit.

It will, but again, if they're on the same team, the team will score exactly the same number of runs either way, so the difference to them isn't even academic.

OK, but what I'm getting at is when players aren't on the same team. If Bourjos had been full time last year, Trout would have been in left most if not all of year. BR has Trout at oWAR of 8.8 and Cabrera with an oWAR of 7.8. In comparing players on different teams, how big of a hit would Trout have taken if that had been the case? I'm sorry if I sound ignorant on this stuff, but most people who have been here a while know that I've never been a huge stat guy.

The WAR hit is not theoretical, it is real. Trout produces less value if he plays LF than CF (fact).

This is true, but doesn't that help Trout here? The only reason he's playing LF is because of Bourjos. WAR tries to measure context nuetral value and if Trout were playing a vacuum he'd be more valuable because on ~27 other teams he'd be the CFer.

Edit: this was a little harsh. So far Trout has played much better than Machado and has done it for twice as long.

You're using one set of metrics, I was using another, and by BB-Ref Machado's having a slightly better overall year than Trout. Trout was better last year, but I'm going by current form, and at their ages a year's head start is a lot. You can argue otherwise by using your metrics, but that "much" better is a huge stretch.

Let's give the man some credit.

How am I not giving Trout credit? He's a fabulous player who's one of the three great young talents in the Majors right now, and last year was arguably one of the greatest 20-year olds ever. If that's not giving him credit, I guess I'll have to ask what more there'd be to say, other than to sit back and enjoy them both before they start running into walls or getting crashed into by some 250 lb. lummox.

The difference between HMT and MMM is that it took four years for MMM to be on the same productive page, whereas HMT all hit the ground running at the age of within a few months of one another.

Meh, I think you're picking nits here. Mantle had an awesome season at 20 years of age in 1952. Mays missed essentially all of 1952 and did miss all of 1953 to military service, but exploded as soon as he returned in 1954. Mathews was very good, great for a 20 year old rookie, in 1952 and blew up in 1953. But for military service they would all three very likely have had great seasons in 1952, especially for 20 and 21 year old kids.

You can argue otherwise by using your metrics, but that "much" better is a huge stretch.

Ok, using bWAR Trout has been worth 7.6 WAR per 600 PA, Machado 6.5. Considering that Trout has done it for twice as long and less of his value is tied up in defense (Trout having a +8 UZR/150 is reasonable, Machado having a +25 UZR/150 is not) I think it's fair to say that Trout has been much better and projects to be much better in the future, although obviously Machado is a great player and could outpeform Trout going forward.

Ted Williams, Charlie Keller, and Pete Reiser in 1941 are awesome as well. And they serve as warning about what fate can have in store for those sort of projections. About the same age, had very great years, all three had problems staying injury-free, and all three lost time to the military.

Here's why I didn't get Bonds in that search. Naïvely assuming that anybody who accumulated 10.9 freaking WAR in a season would have positive Rfield, and wanting to see the Rfield, I entered "Rfield ≥ 0." But in 2001 Bonds had an Rfield of -5. He is the only player to have 10.9 WAR or higher and negative Rfield; in fact he had 11.9 that year, a scary thought about his offense.

Fair enough. If Trout were "legitimately" a LF playing alongside an ordinary or mediocre defensive CF, his value would be quite a bit less. WAR always has to be read critically alongside the way a team decided to deploy a player, which isn't always going to be either optimal or directly comparable to how another team would use him. (Like, for instance, keeping him in the minor leagues for a month :)

A famous example would be Jackie Robinson in 1947. (I guess there aren't any more famous seasons :) Out of position at first base, his dWAR was -0.9 and his oWAR 3.3, for 3.1 WAR and the 176th-best rookie season (by WAR) since 1947: and this is the guy they named the Rookie of the Year award after. He actually had the third-best rookie season by WAR in the NL in 1947, after Earl Torgeson and Bobby Thomson. But even despite a few extrinsic reasons to give him a Rookie award, he was a better player than Torgeson or Thomson; their teams would have traded either of their seasons to get him that year.

Here are the numbers for LF and CF, as an example, and assuming the player adjusts from a position switch typically (not all do, you might have a rare player who is actually a better fielder in center)

Now play him in center field. He now has a -8 position adjustment. But he's being compared to worse fielders. Instead of being compared to Adam Joneses, he's being compared to Jonny Gomeses. On the same number of opportunities, he's now +30 runs instead of +20. BUT - he doesn't have the same number of opportunities. A left fielder only gets 70% as many chances, so now he's +21 on defense.

Add that to the position adjustment and offense, and he's +63 vs average, +83 vs replacement, 8.3 WAR.

It's the equivalent of batting a top hitter in the #9 spot instead of leadoff or middle of the order - he just doesn't have as many chances to impact the game.

In theory, a CF moving to LF will put up higher fielding numbers in LF than he would in CF; on average, across all players, that should match the positional adjustment (at least as employed by BB-Ref's WAR, unless that changed, which I guess it could have). In practice, Trout is not as good in LF relative to other LF as he was in CF relative to other CF, imo.

Thanks AROM. That was exactly my point, only explained 100 times more clearly. I think this is the one thing that people don't recognize about dWAR vs. oWAR. They both depend on opportunities; however, the extent to which oWAR depends on opportunities (i.e. plate appearances) is still dependent on the ability of the player (mostly). However, dWAR, there is much that is outside of the control of the defensive player (which position they are playing and how many balls they see due to the pitcher and the hit distribution) that is independent of their ability. This introduces noise when trying to use dWAR as a measure of ability rather than a measure of value produced.

Man, even AROM has forgotten the great replacement level truce of 2013. :-) That would be +94 vs replacement (or +96 in the AL, +92 in the NL).

On CFs in LF:

Wouldn't a "true" average CF playing in LF make a lot more OOZ plays than the average LF that he'd make up for a reasonable portion of the drop in BIZ from CF? (I guess DRS uses "good plays" but that's about the same thing yes? Looks like no.)

I'm not sure how many guys fit the bill but Gardner 2011 had 192 BIZ and 113 OOZ in 1159 innings. This year as a CF he's so far at 122 BIZ and 46 OOZ in (amazingly conveniently) 580 innings, exactly half. So he's on pace for 244 BIZ but only 92 OOZ or 336 overall; as a LF he had 305. That's only a 10% difference in raw number of balls and if the OOZ are worth more, he'd produce as much value overall.

In his prime, Crawford also got about 320-340 total plays although those were more weighted towards BIZ. And, fair enough, BJ Upton (slightly above-average by UZR) was usually getting about 400 so 80% for Crawford with generally fewer OOZ. But then those were Upton's big years (average 8 UZR/150). Matt Kemp (fewer OOZ) seems to be about 360 total but some years with big OOZ totals.